Video: Replicating symbols in perspective

In this exercise we are going to introduce a symbol into our perspective scene. This is something I have created in advance for you, and we'll see just how flexible symbols can be. I have saved my progress as Roof in place.ai, it's found inside the 28_perspective folder, and I am going to go ahead and switch to the Perspective 1 layer for now, and I am going to bring up my Symbols panel. And you can see here, inside this Symbols panel next to facade is a symbol called panes. Go ahead and drag it and drop it into your scene like so, and then go ahead and switch to your Perspective Selection tool, which you can get by pressing Shift+V and I want you to switch to the left- hand pane here inside of the widget.

In Illustrator CS5 One-on-One: Mastery, the third and final part of the comprehensive Illustrator One-on-One series, author and industry expert Deke McClelland shows how to take advantage of the wide array of dynamic effects in Illustrator CS5. Deke explores Illustrator’s powerful Gradient Mesh feature, great for creating photorealistic airbrushing effects. He also covers graphic styles, the liquify tools, envelope-style distortions, the new Bristle Brushes, 3D text, and perspective drawing. Exercise files accompany the course.

Replicating symbols in perspective

In this exercise we are going to introduce a symbol into our perspective scene.This is something I have created in advance for you, and we'll see just howflexible symbols can be.I have saved my progress as Roof in place.ai, it's found inside the28_perspective folder, and I am going to go ahead and switch to the Perspective1 layer for now, and I am going to bring up my Symbols panel.And you can see here, inside this Symbols panel next to facade is asymbol called panes.Go ahead and drag it and drop it into your scene like so, and then go ahead andswitch to your Perspective Selection tool, which you can get by pressing Shift+Vand I want you to switch to the left- hand pane here inside of the widget.

And I'm going to go ahead and drag this guy into place over here on theright-hand portion of the building, and drop it into place.Now we've got a set of Windows which is awesome.Now I want to replicate these windows;all over the place in fact.So I am going to go ahead and drag the windows over to the left-hand side of thescene, and I'm pressing the Shift key as I drag to constrain the angle of mydrag, and before I release, I'll press the Alt or Option key, and that willensure that I create a clone at a similar location inside of my scene over onthe left-hand side of the building.

Now I am going to nudge things over by pressing the Right Arrow key, but thatseems like it's nudging that window too far, so I am just going to go ahead anddrag it back a little bit and I should really press the Shift key.Well, I perform that drag and you know what, I'm just going to zoom way the heck in here.And I'll go ahead and drag back a little bit while pressing the Shift key, untilI move the Windows to about there let's say. All right!Now I'll go ahead and zoom out.At this point these windows should have a kind of drop shadow, and the reason Iam introducing a drop shadow is I want them to have a kind of beveled effect,and you could try to apply something like a 3D extrusion.

We'll see out how to extrude in 3D space in the next chapter.However, when we are working in perspective like this, a drop shadow isan easier solution.So I am going to Shift+Click in the right-hand windows to add them to theselection and I don't need that bounding box.So I am going to press Ctrl+Shift+B, Command+Shift+B on the Mac to get rid of it.Then I am going to go up to the Effect menu and choose Stylize and then I'llchoose Drop Shadow or if you have loaded Dekekeys, you've got that shortcut ofCtrl+Alt+E, Command+Option+E on the Mac, and I believe these are the settings Iam looking for this time around, and that is to say that I have set them all toMultiply of course, Opacity cranked all the way up to 100%, X Offset -1.5, YOffset -0.5 point, and then Blur 1 point, Color is set to Black, that's it.

Click OK, and then to get a sense of what that looks like, press Ctrl+H,Command+H on the Mac.Not necessarily the most realistic window effect, but I think it fits with thecartoon sort of approach to the scene. All right!Having done that, I am going to go ahead and press Ctrl+H, Command+H again inorder to bring back the selection edges.Click off those path outlines, click on the right-hand windows to select themindependently of the left-hand ones.Go ahead and drag this window without pressing any keys at this point, up ontothe left here, onto the facade and then press the Alt key or the Option key inthe Mac in order to duplicate those windows in the place.

Now why aren't we seeing the Windows?Because they're too low in stacking order.So I will go ahead and drag this orange square, up into the Perspective 2 layerlike so, so that we bring the windows into the program.You know those windows are too small in my opinion.So I'll press Ctrl+Shift+B, Command+Shift+B on the Mac in order to bring up mybounding box, and then I'm going to Shift+Alt+Drag, or Shift+Option+Drag one ofthe corners handles.The reason I am pressing these keys is, Shift, is ensuring that I'm constrainingthe windows proportionally, and Alt or Option ensures that I scale the windowsfrom the center outward.

Until I get something like this here, and I'll press the Down Arrow key a fewtimes in order to scoot those windows down.That looks pretty good to me. All right!Now I want to go ahead and move the windows onto a different side of the house.So I am going to go ahead and drag these windows, and you know what, I don'twant to drag the big window.So, I'll undo that.I'll go ahead and switch to these windows here, instead.And I'll drag them over here onto the right-hand wall and I'll press the 3 keyof course in order to switch to the right pane.However, look what's happening to the windows, and this kind of stuff happensroutinely when you're working with the perspective gird.

I fundamentally do not understand why this kind of transformation is occurring.I suppose it has something to do with the way I have my pane setup, but I'lltell you, it is a pain, that's for sure, pun intended.I'll go ahead and press the Alt key or the Option key on a Mac and release inorder to bring those windows onto that wall.Again, they're on the wrong layer, so I'll go ahead and drag this orange squareup onto the Perspective 2 layer here inside the layers panel, and I still havemy Bounding Box active.So I will just go ahead and reduce the height of my windows and I'll expandtheir width as well, by dragging that side handle and then I will press the LeftArrow key to nudge those windows to the left a little bit, and I might tuck thewindows up a little bit as well,, like so. All right!Now, I'll press Ctrl+H or Command+H and I have got to press Ctrl+Shift+B orCommand+Shift+B as well, to get rid of all the interface doodads.

My drop shadows are now at the wrong angle.So if I wanted the windows to be indented into this dovey house here, then Ineed to switch the angle of the drop shadow and I am going to do that in theAppearance panel, by clicking on Drop Shadow, while this item is selected which it is.And I'm just going to change to negative X offset value to positive, and thenjust to make sure I have got it right, I'll turn on the Preview check box, thatlooks fine to me, click OK, in order except that change. All right!Now we need to add the windows over here on the far right wall.So I will go ahead and drag those windows so they are still selected, and once Iget them on the right hand wall, now they are just dinky.

I'll press the Alt key or the Option key on the Mac in order to clone them to this location.Boo! I say to that.So I will press Ctrl+Shift+B or Command+Shift+B on the Mac to bring back mybounding box, and you know what, I'm just going to drag a corner handle.I am not pressing the Shift key or anything.I'm just dismayed by the appearance of this window right now.This looks better to me.Once I get it to a decent size like -- and I think about this, I'll go ahead anddrag by pressing the Shift key and the Alt key, so that I can clone thosewindows into a different location, like so.

If you decide you want the windows to be bigger at this point or smaller whathave you, then I would undo that last modification and then change the size ofthe windows like so and then re-clone them, so that each of the windows is ofthe same size and perspective on this wall.So I'm pressing the Shift and Alt keys, Shift and Option on the Mac, drop thosewindows into place, looks good.I'll go ahead and grab both of the windows and scoot them over by pressing theLeft Arrow key a few times. All right!Great!Now I'll click off, click on one set of Windows;drag them out to the top, like so.

Some of the stuffs are really great, like this, My Gosh!Just moves in a perspective. Awesome!Press the Alt key or the Option key on the Mac.Let's make these windows bigger by Shift+Alt+Dragging them, and may be, maybe not Shift.Well, yeah, let's keep the Shift key down, what the heck?And of course, the windows are in front of the balcony, that's not realistic. I don't think.So I'm going to go ahead with the Black Arrow tool, because I am sick of workingwith that other tool, and I will Shift+Click on these guys like this.So I've got all the windows on the side of the house selected.Ctrl+Shift+B Command+Shift+B on the Mac, to hide the bounding box.

Press Ctrl+H or Command+H on the Mac so that I bring back the selection edges.Go to the layers panel and let's go ahead and drag this purple box this timefrom Perspective 2 down to Perspective 1, so that we move the windows behind the-- what is that I thing, balcony, and then go to the Appearance panel, this dropshadow is a little bit too big.Go ahead and click on the word drop shadow there, and I'm going to take theOffset value down to 1.So, not that much lower, but just a little bit lower and then click OK and thatmitigates the drop shadows just a little bit and we get this effect here.

Now, you may look at this and say, well, okay, that's great!You've just got done duplicating a bunch of windows, but why did you have todo that with a symbol?I mean what was the point?You could have done that with four squares and they just would have beenrepeated over and over again.Well, I will show you the point of having worked with the symbols, because nowwe can update all the windows in one fell swoop in the very next exercise.

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